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September 19, 2011

Sarkozy: The new Napoleon Bonaparte?

Small men. Big ideas. Glamorous wives. The similarities between Nicolas Sarkozy - the son of a Hungarian immigrant - and Napoleon are uncanny – and now have been explored in a book by France's foremost political commentator....Both will be remembered as vertically challenged men in a vertiginous hurry. Both were helped into power by beautiful wives, with whom they quarrelled. Both believed that they had a destiny to rebuild France and, above all, to change the way the French think of themselves. Both are known for a weakness for kitsch and anything that glitters....Both came from non-French, minor aristocratic backgrounds and despised the Parisian elite. Both had, from the start of their career, an obsession with image and grasped the importance of controlling the media. Physical stature alone has inevitably encouraged comparisons between Napoleon Bonaparte and Nicolas Sarkozy. President Sarkozy is almost exactly the same height as L'Empéreur, about 5ft 6in, which was, in fact, respectably tall in Napoleon's day...More